Posted 1 year ago on March 10, 2013, 10:48 p.m. EST by OTP
(-203)
from Tampa, FL
This content is user submitted and not an official statement

I've read a few very interesting threads on the state of drugs and big pharma on here tonight. So let me ask this. Out of all the people you know and are around on a regular basis, what percentage are on drugs?

For the sake of this post, "On Drugs" will mean any of the following:

Drinking

Smoking pot

Hard drugs

Pills for anything

Im going to guess that well over half the nation is on drugs. Perhaps even as high as 80%.

111 Comments

80% would be my guess
I find solutions - legalization a more interesting issue. Without the reasons, I would propose:.
marijuana legally available like beer for adults
virtually all hard drugs available by legal prescription for adults

like most things in America the war against drugs is a war for profits

minor questions-
some people drink because they like the flavor, not because they want to change how they feel - say one beer with dinner - should they be included?
some people take heart meds - so they don't die - should they be included?

Disclaimer: I don’t drink alcohol, smoke cigarettes or marijuana; and have never done any hard drugs. The only drug I take is a steroid injection in a bum shoulder from old injury about twice a year. So, my opinion is that of an outsider.

It seems to me alcohol abuse has proven itself to be prevalent. It damages lives and society more than any other substance. Just following the news, most auto related accidents and deaths are involve alcohol. Most family violence incidents involve alcohol. Public drunkenness and anti-social behavior seem rampant. Alcohol probably ruins more lives than any other single reason.

I doubt prohibition would work any better than it did in the 1920’s. Still, something needs to be done. I view alcohol as a serious public health issue.

I don’t know enough about marijuana to give an opinion. But it’s clear it’s clear criminals and gangs are making a fortune selling it.

"The book marshals pages of statistics and legal citations to argue that the get-tough approach to crime that began in the Nixon administration and intensified with Ronald Reagan’s declaration of the war on drugs has devastated black America. Today, Professor Alexander writes, nearly one-third of black men are likely to spend time in prison at some point, only to find themselves falling into permanent second-class citizenship after they get out. That is a familiar argument made by many critics of the criminal justice system, but Professor Alexander’s book goes further, asserting that the crackdown was less a response to the actual explosion of violent crime than a deliberate effort to push back the gains of the civil rights movement."

"like most things in America the war against drugs is a war for profits " - so true.

As someone who has done illegal drugs in the past, I have to say that heroin being illegal had nothing to do with why I never did heroin. Same with coke, crack, meth, and pills. I never did these because of what they do to people. Obviously being illegal hasn't stopped anyone from doing these drugs either and putting them in prison or giving them track records only prevent them from getting past addiction or getting out of a hole.

Incarceration for drug use makes no sense. People that are in prison or jail for possessing a drug are no different than a political prisoner.

I agree marijuana should be legalized, and the rest need to be decriminalized.

All the money spent on the war on drugs could pay off all the student loan debt. But this country would rather put people in jail and prison for drugs instead of paying for education.

Education over incarceration.

The money would better be spent toward providing opportunity to those where opportunity is bleak.

Either one of em would be a drastic improvement over what we are currently dealing with.
↥twinkle ↧stinkle permalink

Well, one has the capacity to have more people on board simply because the concept incorporates the treatment within it, it treats all people with dignity, it has been done before with success, it can prevent future health problems which people will pay for in taxes (hep C/HIV), and the end goal is to eradicate it. When you look at countries that have had to go to prescribing small amounts of heroin for those people that have failed in all other attempts to kick it, there was a drop in thefts and many were able to function in society. It's also very much about the least harm to society.

One of the problems that I have when we talk about treatment is that many organizations do not keep track of success beyond three months AND if if people fail then the fall back is, of course, the individual has to assume responsibility. Nobody questions this. So, we need to establish a different criteria of what constitutes success and extend the time frame.

If it doesn't change at the federal level then the future gets pretty sketchy because any incoming president can just enforce the laws as it stands and it's back to square one. There is already a movement in the US for the harm reduction method and you aren't reinventing the wheel.

How many more people need to fill the prisons for the for profit prison industry? They constantly lobby for harsher laws.

The drug laws are the biggest reason behind the gun violence. They create an underground market in which massive profits can be made from something declared illegal. This is where gangs make their money. They make their money from the illegality.

The expansion of the "surveillance tools and analytically devices" you mention, mostly are illegal, but the government does them anyway. The ACLU is raising hell over this issue because of how unconstitutional it already is. Expanding this would be unconstitutional in a majority of ways.

The drug laws are the new jim crow. Look into it.

Prohibition is not working. It hasn't worked and it's not going to. Killing people, incarcerating them, etc... are idiotic and much worse than people getting drunk. Elliot Ness was a "just following orders" cop. Prohibition created a criminal organization which lead to murder from both the criminal end, and on Ness's end. All of which are idiotic in comparison to the original problem. I find your suggestion of forming another Untouchables group sad. Maybe Sean Connery can reprise his role as a cop destroying lives because someone grew a plant that smells bad.

There has been a ton of progress on marijuana lately. The people who enjoy marijuana are off the couch and they want to smoke freely. As with anything and anyone, they could be doing more. Even you could be doing more for whatever it is that most interests you.

Everyone should want to stop injustice even if they are not part of the group being oppressed.

it's not just about potheads that you know. And it's not just about weed.

Gangs are environmental. THINK ABOUT IT.

The laws are the problem. Enforcing them is not working. It won't work either. All that will happen is more and more people will be put in jail/prison. And new users will replace them. Putting people in prison is not a solution, it is itself a problem. You catch one seller, a desperate user in search for more will take his place and profit until he is caught. This cycle will repeat.

It is not between enforce the law and change the law when thinking of a solution. The only solutions involve changing the law or getting rid of the law.

Enforcing these laws is a theft from funding that could be going toward education, health care, infrastructure, and much needed social programs.

He seems to understand the problems of enforcing the laws yet he even states he does not care whether or not the laws change.

"if the law were properly enforced, drug availability on the city streets would be almost nonexistent" - what the fuck is he talking about? The enforcement has done nothing to get drugs off the streets. People are coming up with new drugs to replace the drugs that are hard to get. And these replacements are often even more dangerous.

But if the law were properly enforced, drug availability on the city streets would be almost nonexistent. And if that were the case, there would be far far fewer people arrested for minor drug offenses. Highschool kids would not be indoctrinated to the concepts:

it's fun to break the law
the organizational structure of society has incorporated a degree of hypocrisy of such magnitude that nothing and no one is credible
authority is, by virtue of the war on drugs, either willfully deceitful or outright corrupt
to lie is the American way
everyone breaks the law

This list of perceptions are unavoidable, whether one is conscious of them or not, when one is engaged in recreational activity that is in violation of federal law.

This also applies to the non-prosecution of the wallstreet criminals - fostering a white collar crime culture.

True, but there seems to be a disconnect between the images that are being portrayed as if those in prison are all victims when, in fact, they are not. I don't mean a disconnect between you and I as we have had these conversations before. I mean a huge disconnect between how this is often found in the media and in arguments that are found here.

I find the same issues crop up when we discuss stop and frisk and plea deals/trials.

Actually there are plenty of times an individual should be jailed. Generally many of those "if" actually guilty - should be run through a wood chipper or at least be shot in the head. A majority in prison now? Are there for non-violent crimes ( crimes of what "should be" a matter of personal choice ).

Problem is - the wrong people are in charge - those insane greedy bastards that are also poisoning the world and are throwing families out onto the street - all for money - all denying the consideration of a healthy society.

The only area we seem to disagree is whether or not the rest of the war on drugs will.actually solve anything. I think its all aproven failure.
↥twinkle ↧stinkle permalink

Our arguments are only split on my call for decriminalization with full use of harm reduction and yours for legalization and regulation via the state.
Each direction carries a very different set of consequences. That's it.

Ya. I didn't work this hard to get the hell out and make a better life for my kid to hand it over to some "I want to get high" crap.
Decriminalization in small amounts and harm reduction method. Look into it.

Those kinds of dealers wouldn't exist if the shit was legal and regulated.

Prohibition creates Capones. It gives gangs a market to thrive on.

Those people you talk about were psychopaths.
↥twinkle ↧stinkle permalink

Wrong. You didn't change opportunity. The same people will go to jail because they don't have a license. Have you ever seen the cops line up in front of a financial institution? Everybody says, "Hey....what are you doing? They are harming we the people....."

Do you think they will sit idly by should it become regulated? Hell, no.
There is money in it. You throw posts and threads out here on the duopoly and lack of regulation. How can anyone vote for these people? Threads and posts on the psychopaths that profit off of war or Wall Street?

And yet, all of a sudden this will make the world a better place because of the regulation? REALLY?

Pfftt.............

Let me remind you that Capone was not considered a bad guy for a good many people. He was a bad guy if you didn't get your cut. In the end, why did he go to prison?

the comparison is absolutely necessary because they are punished completely different.

One gets prison. The other gets to stay at home.
↥twinkle ↧stinkle permalink

Then don't deal. It's pretty simple. I hear you say opportunity and treatment and education. But, I am not hearing too much on an examination of treatment. I am not hearing too much on an examination of degrees that can be obtained while in prison. Opportunity is also quite vague and there is not much that is being addressed in this arena either.
In fact, when you used your example of a dealer that you knew at age 20 for marijuana, you noted that he had a job.

Rather than solve the problem with these laws, you'd rather support them. "Then don't deal." Who gives a shit if people want to do drugs? Calm down. Why are people on this forum supporting the police state? Shit why not just ban alcohol again?

the guy I knew when I was 20 made 9 dollars an hour at age 30 and his wife had medical problems. He sold to cover costs and profit to pay bills. LACK OF OPPORTUNITY. He only sold to make more money. Had he been able to get a better paying job, he would not have risked being a dealer.

Provide job opportunity with a living wage. That kind of opportunity. Monetary reform like Kucinich's HR 2990 could cover this.

If you want to support putting people in prison for drugs, that's your deal I guess. Keep backing the prison lobby and support the war on drugs. It is absolute theft from tax revenue that could go into education. The prohibition In fact has created a breeding ground for gangs. Everyone knows the best way to keep people out of gangs is through providing opportunity through education and a road to a respectable and good paying job. This is where the tax dollars should be going. Not to funding for profit prisons. People in prison or jail for drugs are political prisoners.

The war on drugs has done nothing to stop drug use. Whenever they close a pipeline a new one forms. It's a neverending war of stupidity that never actually thinks about real solutions.

Alcohol Dealer About 15 years ago, bartenders in some states (Florida is one) were held liable for people who drank too much and got in a wreck. So, the bartender was now liable and could be barred from working in any place that sold alcohol---grocery stores, etc., fined and spend time in jail.

Now, that will be the last time I refer to a bartender as an alcohol dealer.

It removes the individual from society. It is a sanction. Now, the difference in sentencing for crack and powder cocaine has always been an issue. Mandatory minimums have always been an issue. Prison as rehabilitative in nature v strictly punishment has always been an issue.

No one should go to prison for selling weed ( marijuana ). Drugs that you can overdose and die on? You bet that those runners should get slapped down hard.

Like I said earlier - the war on drugs is a joke - a very ugly joke - as those making the money are making tons of money - and only the small individual addict is really getting punished. Multi Billion Dollar Business where the top criminals do not get taken down - you know - those in the financial end of things.

Remind you of another such case? Wallstreet?

[-] 1 points by TrevorMnemonic (6264) 0 minutes ago

My dealer I bought weed from when I was 20, should he go to prison for selling weed?

Why? Because he sold weed? He also worked a full time job, paid taxes, and had a wife. What did he do that was so terrible that he should be put in prison for being a pipeline? He never hurt anybody. He never sold to minors.

Do you see why I think enforcing these laws is bullshit?
↥twinkle ↧stinkle permalink

You replace the big guys with a bunch of small guys. And anyone who has researched recent drug busts know a lot is done locally. And putting people in prison is not a solution. Eforcing these drug laws is the problem

Properly enforced would mean taking the drugs off the streets as they entered the country - properly enforced would mean no government black ops trafficking either - properly enforced would mean confiscation of drug money and prosecution of the drug money launderers - placing all goods that the criminals own on auction and the proceeds ( including confiscated drug money ) into social programs like universal health care and social security and housing for the homeless etc etc etc

Getting addicts into treatment programs not into prisons.

The other choice presented was to legalize the drugs and run them in a safely regulated industry just like alcohol - but with proceeds also targeted to support the health care of addicts.

Illegal Drug runners would have fewer customers and hard time to do when caught.

"Every time you stop the pipeline, a new one will open up. It's how it's always been.
Meth can be made in a house. Marijuana can be grown in a closet. Foreign countries like to smuggle.
And new drugs are being created and outlawed all the time. K2 for a recent example. There have been countless forms of speed.
You obviously don't know much about drugs and you don't need to have done them to understand the history.
If you want to endorse a police state that wastes billions of dollars over and over simply because some neocons have said Drugs Are Bad M'kay.... that's your deal."

THE LAWS INCLUDE GOING AFTER MINOR OFFENDERS. It includes jail and prison instead of treatment.

SO obviously the only answer is CHANGE THE LAWS in regards to ZenDog's own rhetoric.

But the real answer is change the laws and get rid of the majority of them.

Enforcing the drug laws is theft from education and social programs. The laws are a waste of tax payer dollars.

Rather than solve the problem with these laws, you'd rather support them. "Then don't deal." Who gives a shit if people want to do drugs? Calm down. Why are people on this forum supporting the police state? Shit why not just ban alcohol again?

the guy I knew when I was 20 made 9 dollars an hour at age 30 and his wife had medical problems. He sold to cover costs and profit to pay bills. LACK OF OPPORTUNITY. He only sold to make more money. Had he been able to get a better paying job, he would not have risked being a dealer.

Provide job opportunity with a living wage. That kind of opportunity. Monetary reform like Kucinich's HR 2990 could cover this.

If you want to support putting people in prison for drugs, that's your deal I guess. Keep backing the prison lobby and support the war on drugs. It is absolute theft from tax revenue that could go into education. The prohibition In fact has created a breeding ground for gangs. Everyone knows the best way to keep people out of gangs is through providing opportunity through education and a road to a respectable and good paying job. This is where the tax dollars should be going. Not to funding for profit prisons. People in prison or jail for drugs are political prisoners.

The war on drugs has done nothing to stop drug use. Whenever they close a pipeline a new one forms. It's a neverending war of stupidity that never actually thinks about real solutions.

THE NEW JIM CROW. Look into it.
↥twinkle ↧stinkle permalink

Nuh-huh. I keep telling you to decriminalize the smaller amounts and fully embrace the harm reduction method. You could read a little about that here. Pretty simple shit there, Trev.

As you know, I am an advocate against faux privatization in the schools and high stakes testing which is where the money goes. In fact, I am against faux privatization in any form including prisons.

Here let me tell you a little something. By the time I was 12, I could get my hands on anything that I wanted. In fact, there was a married couple that had a known drug house that attempted to lure my (then) 9 year old sister so that they could prostitute her out. I have watched a dealer step half way out of his car, blow a mother fucker away and then turn the gun on me-because I happened to walk down the street, see it and didn't run. I have watched dealers set out to get young girls hooked on shit and been successful. I have lost friends. Hell, a few years ago I came unglued when there was a known girlfriend of a coke dealer that was moving into the apartments that I lived at the time and threatened to break my lease if she did. You want more? I got lots more. That's just what I'm really only willing to talk about right now.

Yeah, pretty simple shit there. You see, I have a limit to my sympathy. I don't give a damn about anyone's high.

Bogus. Just keep saying "properly enforce" like that will solve everything.

It doesn't. It won't. It hasn't. You close a pipeline, a new one spawns. You can grow in a closet and brew in a basement. It's a neverending war that wastes tax dollars and gives gangs a market to thrive.

It is not that people hold faith in it - the drug prohibition war - not at all - it is a fact that the war on drugs was only ever really prosecuted on the individual user ( where it should always have been a matter of personal choice/freedom ). The drug war has never nailed the illegal financiers. The drug war has always been a sham.

And again even in regards to this, CHANGE THE LAW is still at play in the discussed idea of Enforcing It. This is why I was telling ZenDog his argument made no sense.

You're saying decriminalize possession for everything, that is 100% changing the law.

So to say it's either "enforce the law or change the law," you can't include changing the law in enforcing the current laws. Like I said, the argument was invalid. It was an either/or scenario. He kept trying to say how enforcing the laws will end this shit... and the laws are failing.

You people fail to understand even if you take out the big guy then the little guy jumps in. Meth houses for example. You can grow in a closet. You can brew in a basement. New drugs are invented to replace those that are harder to get. They had to start hiding and locking up robutussin behind counters.

The war on drugs isn't just failing for the reasons you mention. It is failing because it doesn't acknowledge logic. Who gives a shit if people want to do cocaine anyway? It's not your life. If they become violent, different story. Bust them for violence just like we do with drunk people who commit violence. Seriously. Calm down, everyone. We don't need a police state.

I don't know. I guess there really isn't any way that someone can say "properly enforce" that will get me to support the war on drugs. It's been such a failure and so problematic, it's hard to believe that people still hold faith in it.

Suggesting to enforce them lacks logic. It is theft from education and infrastructure.

I did not miss your point. Your point should be "change the laws." Since your point is change OR ENFORCE, everything I said applies to you.

So you don't care about gang violence? You don't care about the largest for profit prison industry in the world? This is why you should care the the war on drugs. Not simply based on your usage of said drugs.

The New Jim Crow. Look into it.

Because of Enforcing the drug laws "There are over three quarters of a million Americans sitting in prison over minor drug offenses. That's an outrage. It's unacceptable. Where is the public outcry? Largely nonexistent, that's where it is."

Absolutely correct. Hell, because of the crackdown on meth production, they invented a more streamlined way of making it. It's called "shake & bake." You can make it in a two liter plastic bottle now.

And with the crackdown on the supply lines from South America, the cartels enlisted members of the Russian mob with knowledge of submarines, and now they're building fiberglass subs to smuggle the supplies in.

Drug prohibition has nothing to do with stopping the 'problem' and everything to do with making obscene profits for BigPharma and the for-profit prison business, among others. But you already know this, I'm sure.

meaning they represent a low potential for abuse and the associated behaviors. they among the safest substances on earth to ingest and in fact present the users with many benefits besides intoxication.

I would differ from your opinion on the MDMA. In it's pure form, it is merely a psyche trigger, releasing a substance we have within our brains. The "ecstasy" we feel is already within us, but we run out of this chemical quite quickly, so the pushers of this substance top it up with cocaine, methamphetamine, heroine, anything to give their customers reason to come back for more.

It's the one drug (like I said, it could be all of them) that messed me up for a short time. In it's pure form, most people would give it a miss, simply because it wouldn't work for long.

that is best dealt with by health professionals. however i would infer from that an examination of academic literature on addictions and psychedelics suggests a correlation between psychedelics used in a proper setting and creativity, positive mental health, and an increase in the overall health of interpersonal relationships, as well as an increase in general mental well being.

Ya, it's not soft. There was a whole pack of kids that did acid once, I was among them. One went insane and among other events he mashed an old lady's head into the ground, a girl's dad then held him from behind and got his knee bent backwards, the cops came flying around the corner and one got out of his car and walked towards the psycho kid. The kid yelled "I hate cops!", charged and took him out, then dove into the cop car and beat another cop. He was one of my best friends. The girl whose dad saved the old lady was one of our good friends. The old lady was the acid dealer's mom. Total coincidence. Many total coincidences that night and it changed our brains forever. My friend couldn't be charged with all the carnage he caused because he was not sane. Took me a long time to recover, and suffer I did. The only thing that sets my mind at ease sometimes is weed, because sometimes I feel more high without it.

there is nothing wrong with drugs per see it is the abuse of narcotics and stimulants that is the major problem and one that can easily be managed and mitigated with a proper legal and healthcare system.

And caffeine! The first time I drank coffee and went outside I was like wow so half the country is out of mind. That was long ago but I do remember that it altered my state of mind for sure. Oh 80% is way closer than half to this reality. How can we uphold laws allowing one set of rules about who can do what how. It is absurd to think that this right exists by so-called upstanding people. If they were upstanding Americans they would allow us our freedoms, and might as well because in reality they have not that right and never shall! To say We can do as we so choose is the ONLY acceptable mindset to be American and allow others the same. None harm intended none done is the extent of what laws are okay.

If you are including alcohol, then you should include nicotine (smoking) and caffeine (coffee, soda, energy drinks), which kind of defeats the question to estimate usage. Would you include vitamins also? There are foods and natural remedies that could be also considered. It might be better to restate the question for legal / illegal, need, and other classes. As stated, it is likely 99.9%. Is your point to see what is perceived as "pharma" drugs and others? As for me, I have a beer once in a while, maybe some wine a few times a year, take an ocasional Advil for muscle aches (getting older), soda (caffeine) but nothing else on a regular or irregular basis.